Lust (and the Finer Things in Life)
by Sydella
Summary: He is the Varia's Sun, now and forever. Take a look inside Lussuria's wonderfully depraved mind and you may see a different side of him. First-person POV. [Pairings: Xanxus x Squalo, slight Squalo x Lussuria]


Come gather around, my lovelies.

Oh, do not be frightened. You look at the corpses in my collection and only see them for what they are: carefully preserved caricatures of the people they were in life. But take a closer look, and they will tell you stories of their souls, now gone forever-their hopes, dreams and ambition, all of which I snuffed out like candle flames. Now I lie with them because I am Lust and remorse is nothing more than a stranger to me.

X

When I am done, I reassemble my collection and leave my room. All is silent and still in Varia headquarters, but surely at least one of my fellow Deadly Sins is wide awake. Assassins are night owls by nature, after all. Sure enough, Squalo is sitting on a sofa in the lounge, nursing a hot drink.

I greet him in Italian and at first he replies in the same language, slipping easily into the cadences and rhythms of our mother tongue. Then, with a start, he realises what he's doing and frowns at me, switching to Japanese mid-sentence.

"We have to practice speaking Japanese since the Vongola brats live in Japan and we'll be working with them regularly from now on. Don't you remember?"

"Oh, I remember, _carino_." I sigh and sit down next to him. "I wish I could forget."

He sips his drink. "Are you disappointed that we lost to a bunch of _stranieri_?"

I smile, amused. This odd habit of speaking fluent Japanese sprinkled with bits of Italian seems to work for every Mafioso I've ever encountered. "Of course I'm disappointed. They are but mere _bambini_, after all. But if Sawada manages to lead the _famiglia _for a long time, I'll remove his name from my hit list."

"Don't do that just yet," he warns me. "Xanxus still intends to kill him, you know."

"I do know. Far be it from me to forget." I pour myself a drink of my own and raise my mug. "To the Varia."

"The Varia," he echoes, and we clink mugs. For a moment, we sit in companionable silence as we drink heartily. The spell is broken when our boss, Xanxus, enters the room. Both Squalo and I stand in a show of respect.

"What are you two doing?" he demands to know.

"Voi, we're just talking. Is it against Mafia law now?" Squalo boldly retorts.

In all honesty, I envy him. He has such an unyielding and indomitable nature that even spoiled alpha males like Boss respect him, no matter how grudgingly that respect is given. Case in point: Boss glares at him but does nothing further, and instead turns towards me.

"Lussuria, you are to supervise the grunts tomorrow. They've been slacking off recently."

"Understood." I bow.

"Damn shark, accompany me to the kitchen, _pronto_," Boss snaps at Squalo.

Grumbling, Squalo complies. The door closes behind them with a soft click. Moments later, Belphegor stumbles in and collides with me. "I won't apologise, Levi," he mumbles, apparently unable to recognise me. "Because I'm a prince."

"Lussuria," I correct him.

Belphegor impatiently runs the fingers of one hand through his thick blonde fringe, peering at me and allowing me to have a rare glimpse of his eyes. "Oh, yeah. Well, I still won't apologise."

"Never said you have to," I reply cheerfully. "More importantly, have you finished your homework?"

That shuts him up. On Boss's orders, Belphegor receives formal education once a week from tutors personally approved by the Ninth himself. Heaven knows why-I mean, assassins hardly need academic qualifications to be good at killing people-but Boss insists on it for reasons unfathomable to me.

"I'm a genius," Belphegor mutters. "I don't need to be taught _anything_."

"Well, that's not what Boss thinks. You don't want to go against him, do you?" I pat the prince's head, knowing full well that the gesture infuriates him. If there's one thing he can't stand, it's being reminded of his childhood.

He tries to swat my hand away, and I grab his slender wrist. An awkward silence falls over the room as we stand facing each other, frozen in altercation. And then I smile winningly, with all the charm a Deadly Sin can muster, and ask sweetly, "If you do not complete your assignments, what do you think will happen to you?" We both know it's a rhetorical question, but he takes the bait anyway.

"I'm not a child," he snarls. "Don't treat me like one."

I tilt my head and stare at him through the dark lenses of my favourite sunglasses. "I know that you're not a child. But you are certainly behaving like one, and it is a mother's job to discipline naughty children, is it not?"

"_Bastardo_," he spits at me. "Don't give me that bullshit. You're not even a woman, you're just an _okama_."

I will be the first to admit that this insult-_okama_-hurts me. All my life, I have struggled to gain acceptance and be comfortable with my gender identity. Even now, as I approach my mid-twenties, a few insults about my appearance and mannerisms are enough to bruise my fragile ego. But then I remind myself that I am a professional killer with a body count almost as high as the population of an European principality, and life goes on.

"My, my, Belphegor. So _dolce_." My voice drips with scorn and I do not relinquish my grip on his wrist. "Were you my own child, I would spank you."

"I am not your child, nor am I _a _child!" He twists and turns, trying to escape my grasp. "Didn't you hear me the first time? Let go of me! I command you to!"

"This is not your castle, _ragazzo_." I drop all pretenses and lean towards him menacingly. His eyes, barely visible beneath his bangs, widen in shock.

No more cooing and preening. This is the real me. The Mafia world thinks of me as a human peacock, someone who struts around favouring style over substance. Levi turns to me for healing, Boss cares no more for me than a shut-in cares about the Sun, the children whisper about me behind my back and Squalo looks through me with those cold grey eyes of his. But I am so much more than that, and _Cosa Nostra _would do well to remember that it was I who massacred some of the greatest warrior clans who ever lived, and defiled their bodies afterwards.

"Do your homework," I hiss at Belphegor now. "Make Boss proud. Do not shame the name of the Varia, or there will be consequences."

He glares at me, but in the end, simply nods. I release him and he storms out of the lounge like the damaged royal he is. Squalo enters mere seconds later and raises an eyebrow at me. I shake my head and to his credit, the Sword Emperor knows when some things are better left unsaid.

"Don't stay up too late." is all he says. "Roger that," I reply, and he leaves in a flurry of snow-white hair. Boss approaches him and they walk away together, Wrath and Pride coiled around each other as if they are of one mind.

Through the nearest window, I can just about make out the corona of the Sun, which is just beginning to rise above the horizon. A bleary-eyed grunt shuffles past me with a soft "_Buon giorno_" and an alarm clock rings loudly somewhere in the house-probably Levi's.

It's just another day in the Varia, really. Just another day.

X

The aftermath of an assassination mission has always struck me as an oddly tense and emotional interval. As an assassin's bloodlust cools in his veins, his mind becomes a fragile place.

"My brother!" Belphegor screeches, rocking back and forth like a child-or a madman. He lets out a peal of hysterical laughter. "I killed my brother! The royal blood, it's all over me. I can smell it all around. My brother!" He collapses and writhes on the ground.

Squalo stares at him with a kind of horrified fascination. "I've known this guy since he was a child, but this side of him still creeps me out every time."

I heave a weary sigh. "You and me both, Squ."

Boss sits on a plush velvet armchair, his feet propped securely on a kneeling Levi's back. His left hand holds a glass of red wine, while his right hand strokes the fur on Bester's back. The liger swishes its tail contentedly, sending Kuu a hungry glance every now and then. I discreetly move my pet peacock away until it is at a safe distance.

Levi looks up. "May I search for my Lightning Squad subordinates, Boss?"

"No, you may not," Boss growls. "Right now, you are my footstool, and a footstool doesn't ask questions, so just shut up and do as you're told, trash."

"Yes, boss." Levi meekly resumes acting as Boss's "footstool". Taking another sip of wine, Boss closes his eyes. Squalo goes to him and kisses him in a distracted, almost absentminded manner. Levi watches them in resentful silence. My Sin is in the very air, sexual tension and jealousy combining to form a foul, almost tangible atmosphere.

Squalo pulls back slowly and, with a curt nod in my direction, strides away with the air of a general leaving the battlefield. The tension slowly dissipates and Levi turns his gaze back to the ground. Boss's attention, meanwhile, is on other things: specifically, me.

He looks at me intently now, furious red eyes dimmed ever so slightly by the wine and Squalo's kiss. "How goes it with the newest batch of grunts?"

"They're doing quite well so far," I assure him. "I'll have them ready for your inspection by this time tomorrow."

"Good." Without another word, he closes his eyes again and I understand that I am dismissed, at least for now.

The corpses call out to me. With trembling hands, I gently prod the slowly decomposing skin of a beautiful young man whose name I never knew. Levi resolutely keeps staring at the ground and Belphegor is lost in his own tormented thoughts. Surrounded by Death and Deadly Sins, I kneel in the centre of a moonlit field. Swarms of black flies begin to buzz around me.

And I join them. I join the flies and all of humanity in a feast of evil.

X

On another battlefield, I ask Levi a question that has been on the tip of my tongue for many years: "Why do you allow Boss to treat you that way?"

He gives me an incredulous look. "He's our boss. Of course I would do anything for him."

I shake my head. "That's not what I'm talking about. I know that he has our undying loyalty. I'm talking about his attitude towards you. Why are you so willing to be his slave? He treats you even worse than he does the rest of us."

Levi looks away. "Boss saved my life long ago, and I can never truly repay him. I would gladly follow him to the grave if he asked me to."

"Such loyalty," I murmur. "But does he know that you feel _amore _for him?"

"I would never burden Boss with the knowledge of my feelings for him." Levi squeezes his eyes shut. "Besides, I know that his heart already belongs to another," he adds bitterly.

I glance over at Boss and Squalo, who are silently contemplating the spoils of our latest victims. They are not looking at each other, but Boss's right hand casually rests on the small of Squalo's slender back. "True, that," I concede.

Abruptly, Levi turns on his heel and walks away. Nearby, Belphegor and Mammon are playing a game of poker with high financial stakes; the latter is swiftly accumulating a mountainous pile of gold coins, not that Bel seems to mind. This particular battlefield is strewn with corpses that do not appeal to me-most of them are female, and the few male ones are not to my taste.

All of a sudden, I feel horribly and desperately lonely.

X

Sawada Tsunayoshi is as short as ever and his voice has yet to deepen (a late bloomer, perhaps?) but now conducts himself with more confidence and poise. One chilly autumn morning, he arrives at Varia headquarters in a limo and enters the building uninvited.

"VOOOIII, Sawada! What the hell are you doing here?" Squalo yells. The anger he is prone to in the presence of outsiders resurfaces as if it was never gone. I don't fault him for that-after all, he has a reputation to maintain and if word got out that he actually has a heart of gold, he would never hear the end of it. If only people knew about his almost Zen-like behaviour behind closed doors.

The boy purses his lips and doesn't reply at first. "I was hoping to find Xanxus," he eventually says, his disappointment evident.

"Well, you won't. Xanxus is on holiday in the Caribbean," Squalo informs him.

"The Caribbean?! But that's miles away from here."

"Thank you so much for stating the obvious, Sawada. If there's nothing else, you may leave."

The boy hesitates as if he wants to press us for an explanation, but in the end, he lets the matter drop and leaves as quickly as he arrived. When he's almost out of the foyer, I tell him to give Sasagawa Ryohei my regards. "Okay," he replies, an ill-disguised expression of unease on his young face, and soon his limo is speeding away.

To be honest, I lost interest in the Sasagawa boy once it became clear to me that he was not going to become a part of my collection, at least not in the foreseeable future. I just like making the tenth generation boys uncomfortable, that's all. Squalo watches the limo recede into the distance, then laughs. It's one of the coldest and most frightening sounds I've ever heard.

"Are you all right?" I ask, careful to keep my tone neutral.

"I hate all of them," he says with a vicious smile. "I really do."

"What about Yamamoto Takeshi? Do you hate him too?"

He turns away, refusing to answer my question. "I'll be in my office if you need anything."

That night, I dream about men who turn into sharks and back again. Sasagawa Ryohei stands in the distance. The Sun beats down on my Vongola counterpart from behind, casting a shadow over his face and making his expression unreadable. Sasagawa then says something about innocence, but for the life of me, I cannot hear what he is saying.

I wake up in the middle of the night, only to find that I am lying on a couch in Squalo's office. Also, I am naked for some reason; my bare body is covered by a thin blanket and nothing else. The Sword Emperor is at his desk, doodling on a notepad. He looks at me for a moment and tersely advises me to get more rest.

"What happened?" I wrap the blanket a little tighter around myself, shivering. "Why am I naked?"

"Nothing happened," Squalo whispers. Moonlight shines through a window behind him and lends his already pale face a ghostly glow. "Nothing at all."

X

_Cosa Nostra_'s American and Russian offshoots have been causing mayhem and generating unwanted publicity for the international underworld. On the orders of the Ninth, we Varia are one of the first killer squads dispatched to deal with this.

The night is cold. A few autumn leaves cling stubbornly to otherwise bare branches. It's the last day of October, and on this Halloween night, we prepare to dance on the gruesome battlefields of our opponents and sit atop mountains of their skulls. I have never felt more alive.

As the veil between the living and the dead rapidly thins, we are joined by other assassins. Some are also affiliated with the Vongola, others are not. Tonight, though, ceasefires are called for. Together, we celebrate our chosen profession and all that it entails: death, rebirth and so on. The cycle never ends.

A young assassin, barely older than Bel, washes her weapon in the deep waters of a sacred lake. Our fellow assassins cry out to Death, their war cries becoming delirious and frantic shouts that rise like nightmares into the endless night sky. Amidst all the noise and confusion of this festival of death, Squalo is an oasis of eerie calm. I join him on a small balcony and we sip a bright red drink of dubious origin as we peer over the railing. His stern features are thrown into sharp relief by the dim lighting, and for a heart-stopping second I find myself admiring him.

"We are but mere mortals who place sacrifices on our Lord's altar, in hopes that He will continue to grant us life," he intones, solemn and beautiful. "Nothing is absolute or permanent, and the world abandoned humanity's ideals long ago. Only Death gives us peace and salvation."

"What are you saying, Squ?" I laugh, already intoxicated by the drink and festivities. "Are you turning into a philosopher?"

He smiles ruefully. "Maybe. I feel a little strange. This is a night unlike any other."

I wholeheartedly agree with him. "Indeed it is." As if on cue, a group of heavily tattooed assassins accost Levi and upend a bucket of ice-cold water over his head while chanting a prayer. One of them, a shirtless youth, lies spread-eagled on the ground; he seems to catch my eye briefly before turning his attention back to the ritual. I would recognise one of my own anywhere-an assassin who uses carnal indulgence to ensnare his opponents.

Out of the corner of my eye, I catch glimpses of the other Varia officers partying like there's no tomorrow. Boss observes the festivities with a rare smile on his face. Bel chases after Mammon under the watchful eye of a grunt. Beside me, Squalo yawns and stretches. Wrath, Pride, Lust, Envy, Sloth and Greed-six of the dreaded Seven are here, and I have no doubt whatsoever that Gluttony will return to join our ranks again someday. But to be honest, I'm really not too concerned.

After all, I am Lust, a Deadly Sin. I only care about the finer things in life.


End file.
